Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine Family Development Centre (FDC) staff’s[1] perspectives on their roles and capacity to promote early childhood language learning through good parenting. Design/methodology/approach This research employed in-depth interviews with 30 FDC coordinators and volunteer staff, supported by limited field observations. Findings Identifying risk, surveillance of at-risk families, building community solidarity and activities to support parenting and children, emerged as key components of FDC work. Volunteers softened their surveillance role by emphasising their social support function and personal links to local communities. Most activities aimed to strengthen family bonding and relationships, with fewer specifically addressing early childhood language deficits. Volunteers found the latter challenging, and generally sought to work in cooperation with education, public health and child care staff where projects involved language development. Practical implications Most volunteers said they lacked the capacities to promote early language development effectively and required additional training in such areas as partnerships and collaboration, family and parenting support, and project management. The authors argue that the importance given to partnerships reflects volunteers’ recognition that they need to draw on outside expertise to address children’s language problems. Given resource constraints, volunteers will remain central to family support work for the immediate future. Even with training lay volunteers will not become language experts, and future policy should centre on building a framework of professional support for the community teams. Originality/value This study fills a gap in knowledge about FDC volunteer roles and suggests a need for training that focuses on teamwork rather than specialist language expertise.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors contributing to the competencies and capabilities of Family Development Center (FDC) staff in order to promote pre-school language developmental support amongst parents. Design/methodology/approach A cross-sectional study was conducted amongst 260 FDC staff under the supervision of Thai local authorities in the rural province of Suphanburi in Thailand from July to September 2016. Self-administered questionnaires were used. Eligible participants with at least a year’s experience on the FDC committee were purposively selected. Analyses were performed by descriptive statistics, Pearson’s correlation, Spearman’s correlation, χ2 test and stepwise multiple regression. Findings Only 23.5 percent of staff had a high level of capability. The respondents’ perceptions of their self-capability were influenced by motivation, attitudes toward promoting language learning amongst parents, self-efficacy, sufficient budget and receiving constructive appraisal support (r=0.387, 0.328, 0.366, 0.106 and 0.104, respectively). Marital status was negatively associated with FDC staff capability (r=−0.172). The multivariate analysis showed that 23.9 percent of the variability of FDC staff’s self-capability could be explained by their motivation for working, attitude, self-efficacy and marital status (p<0.001). Originality/value Research findings could be used to improve motivation for working, positive attitudes and self-efficacy regarding parenting promotion for pre-school language development to achieve standardized quality performance. Results of this study could also form the basis for designing effective training programs for FDC staff in the context of the specific organization and community.

Thailand had Family Development Center (FDC) Staff for family promotion and development to strengthen warm relations and social immunization of family members in the community. The RP3 program has been created to enhance the language development skills of people working with small children. This paper examines the effectiveness of the RP3 Program on improving FDC staff skills in early childhood language development in rural Thai communities. A quasi-experimental design was used with 40 FDC staff in each group. The intervention group received the RP3 Program. Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire and analyzed using paired t-test and independent t-test. The results revealed that the intervention group had significantly higher mean scores in self-efficacy after attending the program than before, and also significantly higher than the comparison group (p<0.001). This shows that FDC staff may be able to upgrade and change attitudes through intervention programs and have more belief in their ability to guide their parents. This study may be valuable for local authorities and relevant sectors as a guideline for FDC staff by considering the context of the organization and the community.

This study aimed to identify effective plans using the Future Search Conference (FSC) approach to enhance the Thai Family Development Centre (FDC) staff in early childhood language promotion through good parenting.&nbsp; Data from, 55 stakeholders FDC staff, district and local health centres, Child Care Centres (CCCs), and local authorities from 10 villages of rural subdistricts in a central Thai province, Thailand, checked for correctness and analyzed using thematic analysis, alongside field notes from observations, worksheets, videotape records, and photo voice. Results revealed that applying FSC techniques created a common future and successfully helped participants to understand past situations clearly and factors related to the problem. Three key strategies emerged to enhance FDC staff capacity including 1) organising ongoing training workshops to enhance staff knowledge and skills needed to achieve effective work performance, 2) building teamwork and 3) developing staff morale for working.